Fears over freedom in Hong Kong are rising as an Australian researcher reveals he was followed and profiled by a Communist Party tabloid

A police officer stands guard in front of Chinese flags as pro-Beijing demonstrators hold a counter-rally during a protest march in Hong Kong on July 1, 2018, to coincide with the 21st anniversary of the city's handover from British to Chinese rule.

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PHILIP FONG/AFP/Getty Images)

One of Hong Kong's fiercely pro-Beijing mastheads, Wen Wei Po, has revealed itself as
the stalker of an Australian academic, nearly four days after he
began tweeting evidence that he was being tailed around Hong
Kong.

Dr. Kevin Carrico, a Chinese studies lecturer at Australia's
Macquarie University, has been doing research in Hong Kong for 15
years and told Business insider he has never seen Hong Kong's
position as a center of academic, social, and economic freedoms
face a greater threat.

One of Hong Kong's fiercely pro-Beijing mastheads Wen Wei Po has revealed itself as
the stalker of an Australian academic, nearly four days after he
began tweeting evidence that he was being tailed around Hong
Kong.

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After tweeting a series of photos last week of his unexpected
surveillance tail that shadowed him around the streets of Tung
Chung , Kevin Carrico, a Chinese studies lecturer at Australia's
Macquarie University, wondered aloud to his online followers who
the stalker might be.

That question was answered on Monday, when Wen Wei Po, an arm of
the Chinese Communist Party's liaison office in Hong Kong, came
out with a scandalized
front page spread proclaiming: "Independence advocate from
Australia spreading independence in Hong Kong."

Carrico, who has spoken often with Business Insider, is an
Australian permanent resident and a citizen of the United States
working through an Australian government research grant to
examine the growing tensions between Beijing and Hong Kong.

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That did not stop Wen Wei Po from writing in detail about where
Carrico went, who he spoke with, and even when he changed
clothes.

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Wen Wei Po

"On the afternoon of the 11th of this month, a Hong Kong Wen Wei
Po reporter found that Kaida Xiong 凱大熊 (Kaida or "Kay Bear,"
Carrico's Wen Wei Po name) first went to a restaurant in Mong Kok
to meet with the founder and owner of the online media "Local
News," Zeng Yiwen, and watched the two leave more than two hours
later."

"After that, Kaida Bear returned to the hotel where he stayed,
and changed his shirt at night before attending a party in a
building in Tsim Sha Tsui," the article faithfully reported.

Wen Wei Po, together with Ta Kung Pao, are the
increasingly aggressive pro-Beijing newspapers both essentially
run out of the CCP's China Liaison Office, with a carte blanche
approach to digging into the personal lives of anyone the CCP
deems needs it.

caption

People walk near a surveillance camera on a main street in Hong Kong Tuesday, April 18, 2017.

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AP Photo/Vincent Yu

The incident highlights concerns of a growing constriction around
Hong Kong's historic freedoms, as China under President Xi
Jinping asserts a "rejuvenation of the Chinese people," that
yields to the authority of Beijing.

Carrico's friends and colleagues on Twitter, some of the
better-known China academics from around the world, were at first
lighthearted about his predicament, but soon grew concerned.

Carrico told Hong Kong Free Press he snapped several images
of a woman in her 30s who he apparently thought may have been the
one following him. He did not report the woman to the police
because he was unsure if she was the suspect.

The Wen Wei Po story ran with a photo of Carrico leaving a talk
on Hong Kong and Australian politics, organized by the Civil
Society Development Resources Centre where Carrico was a guest
speaker.

"Considering all of the tensions and problems in Hong Kong today,
I find it unfortunate, but also unsurprising, that the Liaison
Office put so much energy and effort into following around one
academic," Carrico told HKFP.

The lovely people at Wen Wei Po stalked me for a week and wrote a cover story about me once I left HK 澳洲「獨人」港授「獨經」 - 香港文匯報 https://t.co/2qwWfTs2z6

Carrico told
the Guardian that after 15 years of uninterrupted research in
Hong Kong, he hoped the experience was not a sign of the changing
times.

"Hong Kong can't follow China's path of banning journalists and
researchers if it wants to call itself Asia's world city. I think
the Hong Kong government might consider voicing their support for
academic freedom, because clearly this is not a very welcoming
message to send to academics," he said.